Dino Maamria thrilled with Burton’s instant reaction to conceding late equaliser

Posted Sunday, February 05, 2023 by PA

Burton boss Dino Maamria praised match-winner Charlie Kirk after a last-gasp 3-2 victory in a thriller at Fleetwood.

It was a crazy end to the game with all five goals, and a sending off, coming in the last 32 minutes.

Recent signing Jayden Stockley fired the hosts in front in the 58th minute, but Adedeji Oshilaja levelled on the hour mark at Highbury.

Thomas Hamer put the Brewers ahead with 10 minutes to go and the Cod Army seemingly had no way back after Josh Vela’s 86th-minute sending off.

Promise Omochere thought he had rescued a dramatic point deep in stoppage time, but Kirk stole the spoils in the sixth minute of added time to take Albion out the bottom four.

“I know Charlie Kirk’s capable of scoring goals and he did that,” said Maamria.

“It’s a quality finish and that’s what he’s there for. I told him at the end it was nice for him to do it for me for once, because he’s had those celebrations against my teams at Crewe and Charlton as well.

“I was angry when they equalised. I didn’t like after the sending off that we stopped playing, we were just defending.

“What we did for 86 minutes, we stopped doing it when they went down to 10 men. We were very passive.

“I keep repeating the same word, but we’ve got a lot of balls. We came back from that setback with the quality of our forward areas.

“I thought overall it was a brilliant, determined performance. We came here to win the game and we showed that.

“We conceded from two phases of the game where we should do better. But it’s a positive result, an amazing ending for us.”

Scott Brown’s side suffered a fourth straight league defeat and have only won once in their last seven.

He said: “That was schoolboy, that is Sunday League football.

“People think that they can do what they want here and that’s not happening. That won’t happen again.

“I just can’t get my head around it. For us going forward if we think that’s acceptable then we’ve got a long way to go.

“It’s down to players taking responsibility on the park. You can talk about tactics as much as you want, but that becomes about defending your box, leadership and understanding the time of the game.

“You’ve just scored a goal, it’s a time that teams are going to come for you. That’s when you have to have game management.

“Game management comes throughout the whole year, understanding the situation you’re in, seeing it out and you’d take a point here.

“I thought it was a horrible game, they made it ugly. We go 1-0 up, lose a goal within a minute, then get back into it 2-2 and then lose another goal.

“It’s about being organised and becoming a team, being disciplined and understanding the game.”